Cheryl Reavis Read Free Page B

had once been an heirloom grandfather clock in the foyer, but it, like the rest of the hall furniture, had become a casualty of the war, and Maria hadn’t wanted another one. In this one instance, Kate thought she understood her sister-in-law’s behavior. Some things were far too dear to be replaced, especially if all the replacement could ever be was a reminder of what had been lost.
    Kate kept her eyes on the man as she walked the hallway, but she let her mind consider what she was going to tell Max about her being here instead of Philadelphia. After a time she decided that she wouldn’t tell him anything. She would say the same thing to him she’d said to Perkins. She hadn’t missed her train; she just didn’t get on—and that was all these two representatives of the military occupation needed to know.
    She suddenly stopped pacing. This time she had no doubt that the man had moved. She took a few steps closer because she couldn’t tell for certain whether or not he was beginning to wake. If he tried to get up, if he seemed threatening in any way, she would do what Perkins said. She would run to her room and lock herself in.
    She could tell that his eyes were still closed, and she took some comfort from that, but after a long, tense moment, he began stirring again. He gave a soft moan and turned his head in her direction.
    “Eleanor,” he said.
    * * *
    Am I wounded?
    He tried to open his eyes and couldn’t. He needed to get up, but he couldn’t do that, either. He could hear the voices swirling around him. Women’s voices.
    “Move aside!” he heard one of them say. She must have been some distance away. There were sharp-sounding footsteps coming in his direction.
    “You!” she suddenly barked. “Get the parlor and the kitchen fires lit! This house is freezing!”
    “Yes, ma’am,” a young-sounding male voice said.
    “The kitchen first!” she said, still yelling. “We need hot water and heated blankets! Now!”
    He could hear the scurrying of a heavier set of footsteps, and then a different woman’s voice.
    “That way,” she said kindly, and the scurrying continued past him down the hall.
    “Have you made no preparations whatsoever?” the first woman demanded.
    “No, Mrs. Kinnard, I have not. I don’t expect he’ll be staying.”
    He struggled to make sense of what he was hearing.
    Mrs. Kinnard? Acacia Kinnard?
    It couldn’t be her. Acacia Kinnard was...was...
    He couldn’t complete the thought.
    “Indeed, he will be staying,” this Mrs. Kinnard said. “You cannot put Maria’s brother out for all your thinking you’ve won the War. Shame on you, Robert Markham!” she suddenly barked. “Shame!”
    “I don’t think he can hear you,” the younger woman ventured.
    “Of course he can hear me! Robert Brian Markham! Where have you been!” Mrs. Kinnard demanded. “What would your dear sweet mother say! And poor Maria—if you’d bothered to come home, she might not be—”
    Her voice suddenly drifted away, lost in the blackness that swept over him.

Chapter Two
    M arried to a Yankee, Kate thought. If Robert Markham had come home, as was his duty, then his sister might not have married a Yankee colonel. She was surprised that Mrs. Kinnard had stopped short of actually saying it.
    Sergeant Major Perkins’s plan to “take care of all this” left a great deal to be desired, in Kate’s opinion. Her opportunity for solitude had completely disappeared when he’d returned with a number of soldiers, two hospital orderlies and Mrs. Kinnard, the indisputable Queen Bee of Salisbury Society. Mrs. Kinnard had an impeccable Southern pedigree, and she had used it to all but appoint herself head of just about everything, including the Confederate military wayside hospital down near the railroad tracks during the war. Mrs. Kinnard’s word was still law in all matters not under the direct supervision of the United States Army, and, Kate suspected, in some of those, as well.
    “Excuse me, Miss